Another year, another big Washington Nationals trade of a young player for prospects. And this time? They got five names for one, which is kind of wild.
Left-handed hurler MacKenzie Gore — one of the names along with James Wood and CJ Abrams who was part of the Juan Soto trade in 2022 — is off to the Texas Rangers. In exchange? The aforementioned five prospects. With spring training looming, all kinds of MLB trades are going down, and as is the case with the big ones, we’re hanging out trade grades.
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Let’s break it down for you and hand out grades to each of the franchises who made this deal:
Nationals and Rangers trade details
Rangers get: LHP MacKenzie Gore
Nationals get: 3B Gavin Fien, RHP Alejandro Rosario, infielder Devin Fitz-Gerald, OF Yeremy Cabrera, OF Abimelec Ortiz
Rangers trade grades
Is Gore really worth five prospects? I guess when you don’t give up top name Sebastian Walcott, it’s fine. But Gore has been just OK in his four-year MLB career. In 2024, he sported a 3.90 ERA in 166.1 innings. He also threw 26 wild pitches total in the last two seasons. But the Rangers might be banking on him breaking through in his late 20s.
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Even though it’s five names, it’s not five top-100 prospects. That’s something! And on a staff with Jacob deGrom, Nathan Eovaldi and Jon Gray, perhaps they were looking for a younger arm to add. GRADE: B
Nationals trade grade
Maybe one or two of these prospects work out for the Nats, which would be nice. Fien was the No. 12 pick in the 2025 MLB Draft, so he could be a future star. Who knows? None of these are blue chip prospects, but it goes beyond this: It feels like the Nats are stuck in a hamster wheel with their young talent. When you trade for Gore while dealing Soto, you hope that he becomes an ace. Instead, you end up dealing Gore for MORE prospects. The rebuild never ends!
So we could give them an “incomplete,” but we’ll grade it based on throwing some darts and hoping for a bullseye. GRADE: C+
This article originally appeared on For The Win: MacKenzie Gore trade grades for Nationals and Rangers deal
